Research Catalogue

The symbuddy-project is an artistic research project commissioned by ZOOM Children's Museum in cooperation with BG/BRG Keimgasse Mödling. You can follow the research process until June 2023 here. Who will help humanity out of its mess? Machines whom they taught to count, not to know? To run, not to live? Maybe people better ask some ants how to get along with each other. Or trees how to whisper. Or clouds how to build. You will only find what you can imagine! This is why the symbuddy-project aims at spinning new threads of connection to the world. Children are used to being dependent on others - outright and vulnerable, yet daring and almighty. Thus, several school classes form the ideal research team: Together with artists and scientists they play in search for fantastic, possible, livable worlds and explore human and non-human modes of living together in planetary solidarity.

Verena Miedl-Faißt (Center Research Focus, PhD candidate PhD in Art) invites us with "Await what the stars will bring" to walk through her artistic research trajectory. Her contribution poetically narrates on longings, and on beautiful and painful experiences in connection with her artistic practice and collaborative work with her nephew L. Based on Donna Haraway’s concept of kinship, Miedl-Faißt searches for possibilities of relating to each other and seeks ways to make inner processes accessible. The contribution provides insights into her work with children and colleagues and how she creates “materialized relations, co-creations objecting time, space, and loneliness.”

Métlaoui in Southern Tunisia was the find spot of a huge, almost forgotten collection of paleontological treasures. Nowadays phosphate exploitation leaves the landscape devastated. The artist Bochra Taboubi is determined to shift this focus and build an independent, hybrid museum for Métlaoui’s fossils. But how do you build a museum for a lost collection, without site and support? Speculative thinking, drawings on tracing paper and fearlessness have taken her quite far. Invited by philomena+ Bochra Taboubi collaborates, now, with the artistic researcher/teacher Verena Miedl-Faißt , who is mainly working in co-creative teams with children. They will connect a group of school kids from Tunis and from Mödling to build a powerful think-tank for Bochra’s utopian endeavours. 18/04/2023–21/05/2023: Exhibition in the scope of philomena+@the Belvedere 21, Arsenalstraße 1, 1030 Vienna Vernissage: Tue, 18/04/2023, 3 – 5 pm

This is the mapping of an experiential session exploring notions of safe and brave spaces through multiple modes of embodied inquiry during the conference "Collaborative World Building. Socially Engaged Art and Art Education" Symposium, University of Applied Arts, Vienna. May 24-26, 2023 The authors are a group of student art educators and researchers, brought together as a cohort meeting online and shaping thoughts on how safe/brave spaces function in educational and collaborative environments. Through this ongoing dialogue, they have collectively questioned the diverse meanings of safe/brave spaces against divergent cultural contexts, the sometimes conflicting roles individuals take on while navigating such spaces, the capacity (or lack thereof) of safe/brave spaces to encourage generative conversations that might reveal bias and break down prejudice, and the potential impact of these conversations might have on the broader societies beyond academic walls. During the conference, group members guided participants through a set of parallel embodied workshops using drawing, free-writing, and clay construction as vehicles to explore the questions and concerns safe/brave spaces suggest. Traces of these sessions can be explored in this online exhibition.

Die Schüler/innen der 3b der PNMS Gleiß haben Raum, Zeit und schulische Infrastruktur sowie die Unterstützung des Vereins Unsichtbare Elefanten – Kunstverein zur Förderung unwahrscheinlicher Kollaborationen dazu verwendet, um ein Schuljahr lang künstlerische Forschung zu betreiben. Im Rahmen des Unterrichts zu Kunst und Gestaltung, Technik und Design sowie Digitaler Grundbildung wurden die je fachspezifisch unterschiedlichen Werkzeuge und Zugänge erprobt, um neue Aspekte der Welt wahrzunehmen, im gemeinsamen Sprechen und Tun Ideen zu entwickeln, sich Visionen anzunähern, Ziele zu verfolgen, zu verwerfen, unterwegs abzubiegen und am Ende an meist unerwarteten Zielen anzukommen. Es entstanden gemeinsam erdachte Welten in Form einer Online-Ausstellung im Research Catalogue der Society for Artistic Research, in Trickfilmen und Musikvideos. Besonders intensiv wurde über viele Wochen hinweg an Architekturmodellen gearbeitet. Auf der Suche nach einem Ort, an dem die Ergebnisse dieser intensiven Arbeit präsentiert werden könnten, fanden die Schüler/innen einen ungenutzten Winkel am Dachboden der Schule. In einem intensiven Workshop zu Schuljahresende installierten sie dort eine große Diorama-Ausstellung samt Ausstellungskatalog und Vermittlungsprogramm für die anderen Klassen der Schule. Gefördert vom Bundesministerium für Bildung, Wissenschaft und Forschung.